I wasn't talking so much in the brown truck. I went to Syracuse last week. I watched myself going down 81 on Google.
There are live traffic alerts. The feeder run- no offense intended to any feeder drivers- to my center from the hub, I could do blindfolded. No offense intended to shifters but, would it work there? I think skype could be used to eliminate a lot of managers, too. Just thought it was an interesting article. Farmers won't need any more Mexicans soon.

There other other examples of UPS NOT using technology because it did not work in their favor. 3 years ago, a few centers in my area were time-studied using GPS tracking. Every study found in favor of the driver (in many cases, routes recieved more than 10% better allowance). When the time studies started, we were told that the entire state would be redone. Unfortunately for us, as soon as it was determined that the drivers would be required to do less, the time studies were cancelled.

Production standards have been increased twice in the past several years. During that same time, cars with power steering were crushed and replaced with cars without. Routes in p1000 now go out in p800s (no power steering.) Modern production standards using 30 year old trucks.

1- The people who wrote the new loop detail often had no knowledge of the area they were writing. They completely failed to factor in issues such as natural boundaries, traffic patterns, residential vs. commercial stops, different road types, and the suitability (or lack thereof) of a particular type of package car for a certain area. What makes perfect sense when viewed via Google Earth from behind a desk does not always work in the real world.

2- PAS/EDD is focused solely on deliveries, and the system treats pickups as an afterthought. The reality is just the opposite. Good business sense requires us to design the entire route around being able to contain and service its pickups within a certain window of time.My deliveries might vary from day to day, but from 2:55 to 4:30 I have 32 pickups, 400 cubic feet of pickup volume, and an air drop with the airport shuttle to deal with.

3-PAS/EDD fails to account for the multitude of other metric-based hoops we are required to jump thru each day. The company wants us to follow trace 85%...it wants all pickups to be completed within 15 min of the scheduled time...it wants us to maintain an impossible SPORH...and in order to meet an impossible Stops Per Car number it will frequently eliminate entire routes right before start time and fling the volume from those routes onto the floor of whatever adjacent car the packages can be forced into in a desperate attempt to get the preloaders off of the clock and the packages out of the building. A loop detail that works perfectly for a 35 car lineup will fail miserably when 2 or 3 of those cars get arbitrarily eliminated at the last minute. PAS/EDD assumes optimum conditions when the reality is usually just the opposite.

As much as they would like to eliminate the "Driver position" at UPS it will not happen in our lifetime nor our kids lifetime. Believe me if they could put a robot in that seat they'd do it in a second. Could you imagine the cost saving's? PASS/EDD was a great idea and if ever implemented to it's full capacity(run how it should be)it could I believe make this place somewhat bearable to work.But until that's done and we are no longer crossing each other path's in a day then well....
On a side note there was a driver(20 years or close too) fired yesterday for failing to maintain SPORH. Here it comes people be prepared!

Although I am in feeders I am betting there may come a day when drivers for tractors will not be necessary, but that day is still 2-3 decades away at best. The hazards of driving on a road make a human operator a must as the computer has to be programmed to recongize any and all possible dangers when a human can be trained to do this much easier. Not to mention the equipment itself would have to be redesigned so it can hook up and unhook from trailers and sets or a human would have to ride along to do this for it which would make the entire idea pointless. The challenges of an automated system like this and the possible liability issues with it will make it extremely cost prohibitive for many years to come.